D&D 5E [+]What does your "complex fighter" look like?

[GMforPowergamers]

Do people feel that the fighter needs more widgets over the 20 levels, or "simply" different widgets available to choose from?

I want choice round to round, and choice at level up...

I will again use the warlock as my example, at level 3 you have picked to mix and match 2 subclasses, 2 invocations, 2 cantrips, 4 spells and in any given round you can then choose to use some combination of them.

to show the extreme the 3rd level wizard chose 1 subclass, 3 cantrips, a spellbook of 10 spells, and (assuming a 16int) can prep 6 of them

the most complex fighter is the battle master, they have at this point picked a fighting style, a subclass, and 3 manuvers...

at level up that gives 3rd level warlock 10 options from a list that has some of them being more powerful (2nd level spells) this gives the wizard 14 at level up (again 2 of those choices are thing set to 2md level spells) and 6 everyday (although I bet most people keep most the same spells prepd) the fighter has made 4

the fighter has 4d8 sup dice that refresh short rest drawing from a pool of 3(no leveling here... so remember you most likely have the best 3 for you right now), action surge and second wind both ALSO recharge long or short.

the warlock has 2 at will 2 per short rest recharge...and depending on invocation choice may have 1 or 2 more... those 2 short rest abilities come from a list of 4 (2 of them can be 2nd level)
(they both have use weapon attack, use skill, be creative options so that is a wash)

The wizard has 3 at wills 4 1st level and 2 2nd level spells per day (arcane recharge 1 1st level on a short rest)

this is the moment the 3 classes are the most even. 3rd level. Every level the warlock and wizard will get more and more and at most the fighter gets a fraction of that many choices and all from teh same list they could take now at 3rd level.

What can the battlemaster do that the other classes can't? You get to add the Superiority Die (dislike that term), but are all of those maneuvers wholly unavailable to anyone else? There are a couple that are more than just tripping and disarming. I imagine being more explicit on those would help some.

I think making some at will some use the dice (commander strike at will isn't broken at all) would be a start... but again we need MORE of them. ones that scale at level up.

Weirdly, I generally dislike per encounter abilities, although I can see them for fighters and rogues. I can frame it better internally when I think of it as every 10 minutes or requires some kind of set-up, ammunition, or similar. In this case it helps that combats run 2-5 rounds in general. With proper framing the question of "why aren't I just spamming this?" doesn't come up.

I have never had an issue with finding explanations on why you can't spam a move. So I don't know if I could help at all with this.

Fightery mysteries:

• Leadership, Inspiration
• Martial Instruction
• Endurance; from physical hardship as well as from a saving throw perspective
• Heraldry; knowledge of martial peers
• Logistics, Strategic Awareness, Campaign preparedness; building a useful base camp at a dungeon entrance
• Siegecraft, Engineering

all of those are good. SHowing off physically to get social bonuses too

 

[Corinnguard]

Let's assume you could cr

Good post. Thanks for sharing.

Maybe one way to look at the situation holistically is to reference the idea of 4E's roles and power sources (hopefully without inviting an edition war). If someone wants to play a martial controller, that talks about both the aesthetic and mechanism they are looking for. It's less about "complex fighter" and more about being able to be a controller and still embrace the martial look and feel of playing a fighter. Of course for that to work the underlying system needs to be able to accommodate those roles and power sources.

Or looking at a 3rd party company's take on the class. Sometimes another RPG company working under 5e's OGL can produce a version of your favorite class that appeals to your take on what a Fighter could be.

 

[TwoSix]

I think you are right, but the details matter.

One thing I get repeatedly struck by when this topic comes up is how everyone is using the same words and says they want the same thing, but underneath that people are actually trying to fix very different problems.

For example:

a) Some people are really saying that when they play the simple fighter, they don't feel awesome enough. These people mainly want the fighter to bring more awesome moments, because they feel that "reliable" isn't actually something that brings the awesome. Some of these people straight up want to solve the problem by upping the overall power level of the fighter. These sort of people are often screaming, "Fighters need an X that lets them do 20d12 bonus damage on an attack!", justifying that sort of thing by pointing at Meteor Swarm or the light. Some of these people think that too much of that is just power creep and want to add more color of awesome without greatly increasing damage. Typically these people are, "Fighters don't need more damage, but they do need more battlefield control - things that stop enemy movement or impose conditions". What they really want is combat that is less abstract and involves more narration of what they do, even if in practice the total damage that they are inflicting doesn't change or the impact they are having on combat doesn't increase much.
b) Others are like, "What makes spellcasters more awesome is that spells have always been one of the few reliable narrative currencies in D&D." Spells as implemented in D&D are little packages of narrative force where the PC gets to say what they do and it tends to happen. This group may or may not overlap with group 'a', but naturally this group feels that fighters have to have narrative currency of their own if they are going to be in parity with spellcasters and so naturally they want to give fighters spells in some form either with the same per encounter restrictions spells usually have or with some sort of mana point system. Quite often this immediately provokes disagreement though between those that are completely happy to have mundane magic work just like regular magic and those that want mundane magic to be limited to what seems a realistic process of play. For example, the "fighters should have spells" might be perfectly happy with, "And the foe is knocked back 20 feet" as this is the sort of reliable narrative force spells often have, where as the "Fighters should not have spells" believe that knocking back a foe should vary in difficulty based on the size, stature, circumstances, and strength of the foe forcing a test. Very often the point of contention over how to fix the system here comes down to "Fighters should have spells!" versus "Spells shouldn't be written as reliable narrative force in the first place.", with a real sticking point being, "Just how complex should the rule be anyway!" After all, if we are going to test whether the Fighter (or spellcaster!) can knockback the foe based on process of verisimilitude to realism, that's adding a lot of complexity and slowing down play. Quite often the reason spells were written as reliable narrative packets in the first place was just to keep spell descriptions simple and terse. The original designers may have felt Rule Zero in practice would make the result nuanced to circumstance and that rulings would intervene, but if so this failed because both the GMs and PCs have a reasonable conviction that if the rules say something that's how it should work.
c) Some people believe the problem is that the fighter is too generic. These people very much want the fighter to have particular class abilities that are colorful and unique and serve as a sort of guide to roleplaying the character. These people almost invariably want a very strong sub-classing system that regardless of whatever other problem the sub-classing system is trying to solve, ultimately is also making their particular fighter special.
d) But group 'c' is immediately at loggerheads with the people that believe the problem is that fighter has become overly specialized and too inflexible of a one trick pony. These people for example note that while it is possible to make a good fighter that does one thing well and shines in that situation, that will be the only thing that the fighter does well. These people believe 90% of the problem has been that design of spellcasters built almost entirely around spell slots means get more flexible whenever new spells are added as options, while martial classes which are built around siloed class abilities get more inflexible whenever newly added classes and class abilities options divide the possible things that a fighter could do ever more finely and narrowly. You'll get into huge arguments over "Fighters should be made up entirely of selectable bonus feats/manuevers/stances/etc." versus, "Fighters should not be made up entirely of selectable bonus feats/manuevers/stances/etc." because the two groups are trying to solve two different problems.
e) Another group sees all this arguing over combat mechanics as missing the point entirely. This group sees the fighter as already occupying a reasonable space in the combat pillar of play that matches or comes close to matching the spellcaster. They see the problem is that the fighter doesn't remotely have the flexibility outside of combat as the spellcaster. The fighter can only manage to be a good fighter no matter how much we tweak the combat system, whereas the spellcaster can (among other things) teleport, charm, conjure mansions into being, and wish and the fighter at best can build a campfire and tie a rope - things that tend to stop being important after like 3rd level because spells can do it all. This group is like, "How do we give the fighter ability to match spellcasters outside of combat?" To me this group has both the most legitimate complaint and yet also the most difficult to address - which is why most people tend to ignore them in favor of doing obvious easy things like advocating for more damage in combat.

To me the important thing to realize is that everyone's GOALS are not mutually exclusive, but the MECHANICAL CHOICES are mutually exclusive. If you insist on a particular mechanical solution to the problem, you may meet your own goals while denying the goals of other people who also want "the complex fighter" even if those people don't disagree with your goals.

The interesting question then is not, "Do fighters need to be more complex?" as I think they clearly have been going in the wrong direction for like 40 years, nor is it, "Is there a mechanical solution that fixes one of the issues some people have?", because I think almost everyone here is going to agree "Yes" to both question. The really interesting question is there a mechanical solution that addresses everyone's goals. This solution needs to address everyone's complaint without forcing a large group with a valid complaint to make huge sacrifices. And typically, the sticking point on this is that people whose limited goals were solved by some existing mechanical solution are very angry that everyone in the conversation doesn't see that solution as the solution. Some of them don't care about goals other than their own. Others believe that attacking an existing solution is trying to take something away from them (for example, players who felt the Warlord class finally gave them something that they always wanted get really angry if someone suggests the Warlord class shouldn't exist).

Great post.

I would say for myself, as primarily a person in camp e) in terms of concerns, that I would be happy to accept solutions where either the spotlight is broadened for warriors (both casters and warriors make unique contributions across all pillars of play) or the spotlight is narrowed for casters (warriors dominate the combat area, and casters dominate the out-of-combat phases).

In terms of groups c) and d), my personal feeling is that the fighter is too generic, in the context of a game with multiple other specialized warrior classes (barbarian, paladin, ranger, monk). I have no problem with generic fighter in a 4 class OD&D type game.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I think you are right, but the details matter.

One thing I get repeatedly struck by when this topic comes up is how everyone is using the same words and says they want the same thing, but underneath that people are actually trying to fix very different problems.

there are multi problems (in scope, complexity and power but also in 'non combat' things) we all just have diffrent thresholds for what we want where.

For example:

a) Some people are really saying that when they play the simple fighter, they don't feel awesome enough.

yup

These people mainly want the fighter to bring more awesome moments, because they feel that "reliable" isn't actually something that brings the awesome. Some of these people straight up want to solve the problem by upping the overall power level of the fighter. These sort of people are often screaming, "Fighters need an X that lets them do 20d12 bonus damage on an attack!", justifying that sort of thing by pointing at Meteor Swarm or the light.

nobody has asked for a 20d12. The closest I have seen is people asking for some heroic/legendary/martial ability useable 1/day equal to a 9th level spell... and even I only push for that as 'in a perfect world'

Some of these people think that too much of that is just power creep and want to add more color of awesome without greatly increasing damage. Typically these people are, "Fighters don't need more damage, but they do need more battlefield control - things that stop enemy movement or impose conditions". What they really want is combat that is less abstract and involves more narration of what they do, even if in practice the total damage that they are inflicting doesn't change or the impact they are having on combat doesn't increase much.

yes and no... 4e martial exploits can be as abstract as any 3e or 5e fighter abilities... the abilioty to "sunder armor, lower the AC of target by 2" isn't really any more detailed then any spell. or "Leading the attack, 1/sr this action allows you to make a melee attack, if you hit the creature any body that attempts to hit the target before the end of your next turn (so you too next turn) gains +1d4 to hit" or "Warlords favor 1/sr this action allows you to make a melee attack and if you hit the creature grants advantage to the next attack targeting it" or "Tide of iron, as a bonus action before an attack the creature you are about to attack makes a Str save DC XX or be pushed 5ft, you then move into the space he just left and make your attack" or "Wolfpack tacktics you make an attack, but before or afterwards an ally adjacent to the target gets to disengage and move up to 1/2 there speed if they wish as a reaction" or "Sly flurish, make an attack if you hit add your cha mod as additional damage" or "Hit and run make an attack, if you move this turn the target you attacked can not use reactions against your movement" or "Furious Smash 1 creature in melee range make a Con save DC XX if they miss it they take weapon damage equual to your str or dex mod, the next creature to hit them before the end of your next turn deals bonus damage equal to your cha modifire"

none of those massively make the game more complex

b) Others are like, "What makes spellcasters more awesome is that spells have always been one of the few reliable narrative currencies in D&D." Spells as implemented in D&D are little packages of narrative force where the PC gets to say what they do and it tends to happen. This group may or may not overlap with group 'a', but naturally this group feels that fighters have to have narrative currency of their own if they are going to be in parity with spellcasters and so naturally they want to give fighters spells in some form either with the same per encounter restrictions spells usually have or with some sort of mana point system.

yup... and thank you for using mana properly... so many people think of mana as magic, but in pistic island mythology it was called Warrior Mana, and was your ability as a warrior or leader to rise above the common man.

Quite often this immediately provokes disagreement though between those that are completely happy to have mundane magic work just like regular magic and those that want mundane magic to be limited to what seems a realistic process of play. For example, the "fighters should have spells" might be perfectly happy with, "And the foe is knocked back 20 feet" as this is the sort of reliable narrative force spells often have, where as the "Fighters should not have spells" believe that knocking back a foe should vary in difficulty based on the size, stature, circumstances, and strength of the foe forcing a test.

and again, you can make both happy with options... you dont have to take the knock back ability if you don't want.

Very often the point of contention over how to fix the system here comes down to "Fighters should have spells!" versus "Spells shouldn't be written as reliable narrative force in the first place.", with a real sticking point being, "Just how complex should the rule be anyway!"

and again, I don't want spells, I want martial exploits (some of witch may look like some spells)

After all, if we are going to test whether the Fighter (or spellcaster!) can knockback the foe based on process of verisimilitude to realism, that's adding a lot of complexity and slowing down play.

I don't think anyone wants that

c) Some people believe the problem is that the fighter is too generic. These people very much want the fighter to have particular class abilities that are colorful and unique and serve as a sort of guide to roleplaying the character.

yup

e) Another group sees all this arguing over combat mechanics as missing the point entirely. This group sees the fighter as already occupying a reasonable space in the combat pillar of play that matches or comes close to matching the spellcaster. They see the problem is that the fighter doesn't remotely have the flexibility outside of combat as the spellcaster.

yup... this is why I often say that to fix the figher you need to break up the fighter

The fighter can only manage to be a good fighter no matter how much we tweak the combat system, whereas the spellcaster can (among other things) teleport, charm, conjure mansions into being, and wish and the fighter at best can build a campfire and tie a rope - things that tend to stop being important after like 3rd level because spells can do it all. This group is like, "How do we give the fighter ability to match spellcasters outside of combat?" To me this group has both the most legitimate complaint and yet also the most difficult to address - which is why most people tend to ignore them in favor of doing obvious easy things like advocating for more damage in combat.

I agree, even most of my fixes are "I can atleast make it interesting not just attack attack attack... the hard part IS giving them other pillar support

Others believe that attacking an existing solution is trying to take something away from them (for example, players who felt the Warlord class finally gave them something that they always wanted get really angry if someone suggests the Warlord class shouldn't exist).

this is me 100%.... in 2e I would play a fighter hopeing to get to level 9 so I could be a leader of men (please don't end the campaign, I just got to my good part) and 4e (and 3.5 before with martial and Bo9S) gave me the ability to play a smart charasmatic martial hero

 

[Campbell]

What I would want is a class that did not get multiple attacks (or at least definitely not three), but instead has a pool of mostly at will techniques with different tradeoffs, different things they could do with bonus actions/reactions. I'd be looking for strong control/utility and less I do all the damage. I want fewer, but richer decisions basically.

 

[Micah Sweet]

there are multi problems (in scope, complexity and power but also in 'non combat' things) we all just have diffrent thresholds for what we want where.

yup

nobody has asked for a 20d12. The closest I have seen is people asking for some heroic/legendary/martial ability useable 1/day equal to a 9th level spell... and even I only push for that as 'in a perfect world'

yes and no... 4e martial exploits can be as abstract as any 3e or 5e fighter abilities... the abilioty to "sunder armor, lower the AC of target by 2" isn't really any more detailed then any spell. or "Leading the attack, 1/sr this action allows you to make a melee attack, if you hit the creature any body that attempts to hit the target before the end of your next turn (so you too next turn) gains +1d4 to hit" or "Warlords favor 1/sr this action allows you to make a melee attack and if you hit the creature grants advantage to the next attack targeting it" or "Tide of iron, as a bonus action before an attack the creature you are about to attack makes a Str save DC XX or be pushed 5ft, you then move into the space he just left and make your attack" or "Wolfpack tacktics you make an attack, but before or afterwards an ally adjacent to the target gets to disengage and move up to 1/2 there speed if they wish as a reaction" or "Sly flurish, make an attack if you hit add your cha mod as additional damage" or "Hit and run make an attack, if you move this turn the target you attacked can not use reactions against your movement" or "Furious Smash 1 creature in melee range make a Con save DC XX if they miss it they take weapon damage equual to your str or dex mod, the next creature to hit them before the end of your next turn deals bonus damage equal to your cha modifire"

none of those massively make the game more complex

yup... and thank you for using mana properly... so many people think of mana as magic, but in pistic island mythology it was called Warrior Mana, and was your ability as a warrior or leader to rise above the common man.

and again, you can make both happy with options... you dont have to take the knock back ability if you don't want.

and again, I don't want spells, I want martial exploits (some of witch may look like some spells)

I don't think anyone wants that

yup


yup... this is why I often say that to fix the figher you need to break up the fighter

I agree, even most of my fixes are "I can atleast make it interesting not just attack attack attack... the hard part IS giving them other pillar support

this is me 100%.... in 2e I would play a fighter hopeing to get to level 9 so I could be a leader of men (please don't end the campaign, I just got to my good part) and 4e (and 3.5 before with martial and Bo9S) gave me the ability to play a smart charasmatic martial hero

Level Up's Marshal is explicitly a smart charismatic martial hero.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I don't think discussing why is necessary, although it might help explain reasoning.

It sounds, broadly speaking, that most people just want to see more interesting options available to fights as a core feature of the class, not a subclass trait. Again I feel like LevelUp does this pretty well.

You've never actually said how. I haven't bought level up - but I have looked at what they have presented for maneuvers. And to be honest they look like a less engaging system than the Battlemaster's - or to be more accurate they look like ki points for a less mobile class, and I'd prefer the Battlemaster to what I've seen of the Level Up fighter. Complexity to me isn't power or flexibility. It's about how you approach the combat and that you have the tools and motivation to take different foes on in fairly different ways.

All the fighter appears to do with Level Up's maneuvers in combat is the same thing that makes 5e combat its normal tedious and grindy self to the point I would simply rather not play than spend two thirds of my time in combat. You waddle up to your enemy and play patty-cake with them, spamming your best available attack until one or other of you falls over. It doesn't matter what type of foe you have. The increased crit range maneuvers (if you bother) work exactly the same way whether you are fighting a dragon or a gelatinous cube. Which means it's not complex so much as it is fiddly. Frankly the Battlemaster (especially using Tasha's maneuvers) can do very similar things, but the kinaesthetic nature of the superiority dice simply both feels good and is pretty simple and easy to keep track of. The battlemaster might only be 80% of what the Level Up fighter does - but it does it with a whole lot less effort.

I'm going to give this one last attempt. To me there hasn't been a better fighter than the 4e one (I understand people who like the Warblade; it and the Crusader and the Bo9S are head and shoulders above anything in 5e or for that matter Pathfinder) but that doesn't mean the 4e fighter is some sort of platonic ideal.

To me much of what makes the 4e fighter great can be summed up in two of the maneuvers: Tide of Iron and Sweeping Blow that on their own give you a tactical depth and level of engagement with the game world that is simply unmatched in 5e and 3.X alike.

Tide of Iron is an At Will attack that you can use on every turn to push your foe five feet and then follow up into where they were while doing full basic damage. Most alternatives do more damage - but only a trivial amount more. (A 5e equivalent would be to give two Fighting Styles to a fighter but they could only use one at once, giving up the bonus from duelist or great weapon fighter). And the key thing is that forced movement makes the difference between shooting on location and shooting against a green screen. If there's a pit trap that's been discovered it might as well not be there - just an X marked on the floor that no one will step on. Green screen movement. If there's forced movement then if there's a pit trap there there's actually danger of someone falling in it. If there's forced movement and you're fighting by a dock someone's probably going for a swim. The dock isn't just projected on a green screen. Having forced movement makes the world more real. And having forced movement easily accessible and from the fighter's square means that how the fighter stands on the battlefield matters and where you are fighting matters. And it of course opens up entire swathes of teamwork as you position the enemy for AoEs.

And before someone complains "but the shove action exists", yes it does. Using the shove action means that the fighter, whose big thing is that they have been training with their weapons and are good at hurting people with them, decides to not actually hit someone but instead give up all their damage. It's normally a rookie move to give up all your damage. And the fighters with Tide of Iron, because they are a master of combat and the battlefield don't give up their entire attack.

Sweeping Blow is an encounter ability that allows a fighter to attack everyone within five feet of them - essentially a whirlwind attack. But unlike Whirlwind Attack it can't be spammed relentlessly which is a good thing because the enemies won't always line up with respect to each other and the game does not zoom in notably further than 5 foot squares - but the master of battle should be able to see that it's not worth going for this time. (I'm not saying 'Encounter Powers' are the right way but some sort of semi-arbitrary limit on fighter advanced abilities reflecting their seeing opportunities others don't both make them more realistic and immersive, and means that you need to think rather than just spam your best attack - or even your best attack that you have the points remaining for).

The second thing Sweeping Blow does is encourages you to take risks. Diving in to the middle of half a dozen enemies to hit them all will do an impressive amount of damage in total - but it also puts you out there and potentially facing a beat-down from those half dozen enemies. This sort of risk vs reward choice that encourages you to change your behaviour (rather than walk up to your first choice of foe and play patty-cake until they fall, just with a rider or two). It's a risk/reward choice where the availability of Sweeping Blow really changes your calculations.

And before someone complains "but 5e fighters get multiple attacks. You can split them" splitting your attacks rather than focus firing is (other than in rare situations) a foolish choice. One dead target is one target that can't fight back; two wounded targets both can. As a rule of thumb damage on a secondary target is considered worth half that on the primary target. Bad choices are skill tests that add fiddliness rather than adding options.

 

[bert1001 fka bert1000]

b) Others are like, "What makes spellcasters more awesome is that spells have always been one of the few reliable narrative currencies in D&D." Spells as implemented in D&D are little packages of narrative force where the PC gets to say what they do and it tends to happen. This group may or may not overlap with group 'a', but naturally this group feels that fighters have to have narrative currency of their own if they are going to be in parity with spellcasters and so naturally they want to give fighters spells in some form either with the same per encounter restrictions spells usually have or with some sort of mana point system. Quite often this immediately provokes disagreement though between those that are completely happy to have mundane magic work just like regular magic and those that want mundane magic to be limited to what seems a realistic process of play.

For example, the "fighters should have spells" might be perfectly happy with, "And the foe is knocked back 20 feet" as this is the sort of reliable narrative force spells often have, where as the "Fighters should not have spells" believe that knocking back a foe should vary in difficulty based on the size, stature, circumstances, and strength of the foe forcing a test. Very often the point of contention over how to fix the system here comes down to "Fighters should have spells!" versus "Spells shouldn't be written as reliable narrative force in the first place.", with a real sticking point being, "Just how complex should the rule be anyway!"

Great post that captures a lot of ways people want the Fighter "improved" and why this is always a difficult message board conversation without agreeing on the goals and sticking to that box.

That said, I would ask you not to characterize anything that involves a limited effect or narrative effect as a "spell".

There is no fundamental reason spells are mechnically modeled this way and there is no reason something modeled similarly is automatically a "spell". Since the rest of your post was quite neutral not sure you meant to outline this one point of view.

Here's both sides on this:

"Some people think any limited, reliable narrative power is a spell and thus disqualify those powers from martials, and others think you can model martial powers just fine under this mechanical framework without it being a spell (both at the mundane and mythical level)"

I think the limited, reliable narrative powers are seperate from the mythic martial capabilities.

You can have someone who is fine with narrative abilites, like -- "if you hit your target you push it back 5 feet" -- and can explain the 5 foot movement in various ways even if not "physics related" -- you are not actually pushing the dragon but you annoy it enough to move back or whatever. All mundane.

That same person might not be ok with, even at 20th level, "after you attack you can jump up to 500ft to any destination, smashing through any barriers mundane or magical in your way." This gets into "mythic martial" territory and they don't want that.

 

[bert1001 fka bert1000]

I'm going to give this one last attempt. To me there hasn't been a better fighter than the 4e one (I understand people who like the Warblade; it and the Crusader and the Bo9S are head and shoulders above anything in 5e or for that matter Pathfinder) but that doesn't mean the 4e fighter is some sort of platonic ideal.

To me much of what makes the 4e fighter great can be summed up in two of the maneuvers: Tide of Iron and Sweeping Blow that on their own give you a tactical depth and level of engagement with the game world that is simply unmatched in 5e and 3.X alike.

Great examples of meaningful choices.

The 4e Fighter is great within the context of 4e where big non combat utility spells were basically turned into a party resource through rituals, and things like skill challenges boosted / standardized skill contributions.

For 5e, I would look to 4e as an example for combat complexity and add social / exploration abilities then unlock mythic martial stuff at 9+ to compete with full spellcasters in ability to bypass bounded accuracy, even wilder narrative control, etc.

There is some cool stuff in 4e but when I looked recently, despite what some people imply, the 4e Fighter was really mundane, even at high levels. Fun and tactical and had some very cool powers but it's permission space (better then current 5e) was still pretty limited (it worked fine in high level 4e because of the changes to other classes but not as sure in 5e)

 

[Micah Sweet]

Great post that captures a lot of ways people want the Fighter "improved" and why this is always a difficult message board conversation without agreeing on the goals and sticking to that box.

That said, I would ask you not to characterize anything that involves a limited effect or narrative effect as a "spell".

There is no fundamental reason spells are mechnically modeled this way and there is no reason something modeled similarly is automatically a "spell". Since the rest of your post was quite neutral not sure you meant to outline this one point of view.

Here's both sides on this:

"Some people think any limited, reliable narrative power is a spell and thus disqualify those powers from martials, and others think you can model martial powers just fine under this mechanical framework without it being a spell (both at the mundane and mythical level)"

I think the limited, reliable narrative powers are seperate from the mythic martial capabilities.

You can have someone who is fine with narrative abilites, like -- "if you hit your target you push it back 5 feet" -- and can explain the 5 foot movement in various ways even if not "physics related" -- you are not actually pushing the dragon but you annoy it enough to move back or whatever. All mundane.

That same person might not be ok with, even at 20th level, "after you attack you can jump up to 500ft to any destination, smashing through any barriers mundane or magical in your way." This gets into "mythic martial" territory and they don't want that.

Unfortunately, if it works mechanically like a spell, people are going to think of it as a spell. No amount of telling people that's technically incorrect is going to change that. If you want martial abilities that operate like spells do in D&D, in my opinion that's the price.